A Manual for Estimating Disease Burden Associated With Seasonal Influenza

Overview

This manual is targeted at epidemiologists and data analysts with basic epidemiological training who are responsible for data analysis and interpretation at influenza sentinel surveillance sites and the National Surveillance Office (NSO) or Ministry of Health (MOH). After completing the appropriate sections of the manual the end-user should be able to i) estimate the morbidity burden due to influenza-associated respiratory infections (expressed as incidence rates where data on the denominator population at risk are available) and the proportional contribution of influenza to respiratory infections, ii) estimate the proportion of influenza-associated cases of severe respiratory infections who died (case fatality ratio), iii) assess the plausibility of the results, iv) identify gaps in influenza surveillance (particularly related to data collection) and improve sentinel surveillance for influenza.

Supplements:

Using a hospital admission survey to determine rates of influenza-associated severe acute respiratory infections

An operational tool to estimate influenza disease burden averted through vaccination

An operational tool to extrapolate influenza-associated SARI incidence rates from sentinel sites to provincial and national levels